As the use mobile devices, such as cellphones and smartphones became very popular and widespread, the usage patterns of such devices may be helpful to obtain insights about the behavior and characterizing parameters of the users of these devices. These insights are essential to optimally direct targeted information, such as advertisement, to different groups of users that may have common interest in this information. Such insights may be strongly related to the location of users that compose a group.
For example, if an initiator considers opening a new business, a decision where is the best place to open the new business is strongly affected by the common characteristics of the group of users which are likely to consume goods or services from this particular new business. Such characteristics may be obtained by conducting surveys among potential clients or by consulting experts which have experience regarding the type of business and the potential clients' behavior.
Geographical location of a user, as well as changes in location may provide information about the user regarding his residence place, and in which places he spends his time. Location data is readily available from the cellular networks, since as long as the mobile device is active (turned on), it is registered in the closest base stations and by triangulation or other calculations, it is possible to obtain the locations of each user over time with sufficient accuracy.
Prior art methods have already used geographical location information about users, which is derived from cellular networks. For example, location information about users has been continuously collected for long periods of time (e.g., over a month). As a result, changes of locations have been used to obtain information about the user, while correlating it with time. For example, during nighttime, it can be seen that for most users, there is no change in location. Since the stationary location is known, it is assumed that this stationary location is the place of residence. Therefore, it is possible to know where each user lives (his address or at least the street) and to use this information to estimate to which socioeconomic status he belongs. Then it is possible to analyze this information which is collected about all users, to derive several characteristics about groups of users that may have common attributes as a group. However, such a continuous tracking and storage of the collected information seriously infringes the privacy of the users and in some countries, is even against the law. In some countries, such a continuous collection of information is limited by law to be up to 90 minutes only. This limitation results in reducing the ability of prior art methods to characterize the location parameters of the users, in order to construct a reliable pattern of the location of groups of users.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a method and system for characterizing geographical locations of groups of users of mobile devices, which eliminate the need to continuously tracking the location of each user.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a method and system for characterizing geographical locations of groups of users of mobile devices, which provide insights about the behavior and characterizing parameters of the users of these devices.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a method and system for characterizing geographical locations of groups of users of mobile devices, which provide a reliable pattern of the location of groups of users, while keeping the privacy of each user.
Other objects and advantages of the invention will become apparent as the description proceeds.